1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of manufacturing a magnetic head slider used for a magnetic disk unit. Also, the present invention relates to a guide plate used in the process of manufacturing the magnetic head slider.
2. Description of the Related Art
On one surface of a magnetic head slider, there is formed a special flying surface pattern of fine recesses. The flying surface pattern on the surface has a direct influence on the flying stability of the slider, and the recording density of the slider is affected by the flying surface pattern. Therefore, the formation of the flying surface pattern is very important. In order to mass-produce the above magnetic head sliders, the following method is adopted. On a wafer base plate, there are provided a plurality of thin film magnetic head elements which are formed and arranged by means of thin film processing. A rectangular parallelepiped slider block (referred to as a block hereinafter) in which the elements are aligned in a row is cut out from the wafer base plate. A flying pattern is formed on the rectangular parallelepiped slider block. After the formation of the pattern, the block is cut into individual head sliders.
Concerning the formation of the pattern on the block, the following methods are disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication Nos. 6-309616, 6-236508, 7-14137 and 7-73425. According to the methods, a large number of blocks are arranged at regular intervals on an upper surface of a flat base plate and fixed onto the flat base plate by adhesive. A resist film is coated in the blocks, and a mask pattern is formed by means of exposure and development. Then the thus formed mask pattern is subjected to ion-milling (etching processing), so that a flying surface pattern is formed on the block.
However, the following problems may be encountered in the above formation methods. Since the blocks are not directly connected with each other, it is impossible to obtain a sufficiently high positioning accuracy, and an exposed side of the block tends to be damaged by a shock caused by ions. In order to simply solve the above problems, an adhesive agent is made to flow between the blocks so as to fill the clearances. In this case, in order to prevent the deterioration of the pattern, it is necessary to clean a pattern formation surface of the block with a cotton swab soaked with solvent. In this cleaning work, there is a tendency for the adhesive agent provided between the blocks to be dissolved, so that the side of the block is exposed. For the above reasons, this cleaning work requires great skill and complicated labor.
Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 6-67310 discloses the following method. There is prepared a holder which is composed in such a manner that an adhesive tape is made to adhere onto a back side of a sheet on which a large number of holding holes capable of accommodating blocks are continuously formed at regular intervals. A block is accommodated in each accommodating hole of the holder and fixed by the adhesive tape. A flying surface of this block is coated with photosensitive resist. This photosensitive resist is exposed to light, and then the exposed surface is developed, fixed and dried, so that the flying surface pattern can be formed. Thus formed flying surface pattern is subjected to etching, so that the flying surface pattern can be formed. However, this method has the same problem as that of the conventional method described before, that is, a side of the block is exposed, so that the side of the block tends to be damaged in the process of etching.
The sixth example described in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 6-150276 discloses the following technique. A surface of a block to be processed is set downward, and the block is fixed onto a jig. Then, a C-shaped jig used for processing is set on the block, and an adhesive agent is filled into clearances between the blocks being fed from a hole formed on a back side of the jig used for processing. However, according to the above technique, an adhesive agent is filled (penetrates) from the hole into a tightly closed space formed by the upper and the lower jig and both blocks. Therefore, it is difficult to sufficiently fill (penetrate) the adhesive agent into the space. Consequently, the side of the block cannot be protected.